For a while now there has been a hole in the case market. This hole was the need for chassis that accommodate open systems, allowing the end user to easily swap out major components while keeping the rest neat and tidy - one that could play a host to every kind of cooling one could think of. And on top of that, one that could look damn good.

Well the legend that is Dimas has stepped up and made an attempt to fill this gap with the case that's under the spotlight today here at OC3D, the appropriately named Dimas Bench Table Easy V2.

So without further a-do, let's take a quick gander at the specifications of the case which were taken from Chilled PC's product page:

• Bench Desk realised in Metal sheet of 1,5mm• CNC Laser Cuts• Powder or liquid Coating• Totally " Made in Italy"• Compatibility with motherboard ATX and Full ATX and MicroATX installation until 3 peripheral 5,25 inches (like DVD reader, fan bus,ecc..)• Installation until 3 Hard disks (3,5 inches) and floppy reader, or 4 hard disks without floppy reader• Special ventilation for the RAM zone via special support for a 92x92mm fan• Support for ventilation in the socket zone via 80x80 o 120x120 fans• Support for ventilation in the front VGA card zone via 80x80 o 120x120 fans• Two buttons for Power Switch and reset• Holes on the front and rear of the motherboard to allow the passages of cables and liquid cooling tube• PSU supports,compatibility with Power supplies up to 22cm• Lateral holes for the installation of a Triple, Double or Single fan radiator (Thermochill compatible)• Rear space for installation of a compact liquid cooling system• Thumbscrews thread M3 e 6-32• Support for ventilation up to Video Cards,single or SLI/crossFire via 120x120mm fan

Packaging & Package

The Bench table arrived in a rather large double thickness, plain white cardboard box. The box had a simple address label printed out from Chilled PC with the both the recipients & senders addresses marked on it.

Upon opening the box you are presented with a sea of polystyrene. Buried somewhere under that lot is your case, and It left me wondering if i was going to need a shovel. The contents were well protected against the brutal hands of todays couriers and it was nice to see the protection wasn't massively over the top.

Enlisting the help of a few smaller cardboard boxes I went digging through the artificial snow to recover the parts of the case. First to be removed were the blue internals (for want of a better word). These comprised of the mount for the 5.25" & 3.5" drives, the PSU bay, a myriad of fan mounts and a pump/res mount. Also included was a slightly random sheet of foam that had no immediately obvious purpose. All the nuts, bolts and washers were held in a little, tightly packed plastic bag.

Once the middle was removed, along with yet more polystyrene, we got to the two main pieces of the case. The outer shell was shrouded in bubble wrap to give it that extra protected edge, while the bottom tray sat inside it. I continued to rummage through the polystyrene in hope of finding an instruction manual of some description, but alas there wasn't one to be found. This proved to be quite a hinderance, which will be further illustrated over the page.

DimasTech Bench Table Page: 2

Putting The Pieces Together

This part of the review is normally taken up by a thorough look at the externals and internals of a case. But seeing as this came in a DIY format, I'm going to put in a quick guide to assembling the case to try and prevent people from making the same mistakes I did.

Almost everyone should have access to the basic tool list that I included above. Assembling the case without them, while possible, might prove awfully fiddly. So assuming everything is unpacked and the tools are ready and waiting, it's time to begin.

1: Install the drive and PSU Mounts

Using the longer bolts, a washer and nut, simply screw them into the holes on the base where you want them. Make sure you install the mounts with the lip of the tray facing down, as you can see in the first image. The second shows which mount holes are for what.

2: Install the Feet

The feet of the case screw into the bottom lip of the outer shell. They use the larger of the nuts and washers that are supplied in the package.

3: Install the motherboard stand-offs

Using the thin screws in the pack, insert them through the holes in the outer shell and screw the stand-off over the top. Bare in mind that there are mounts for both mATX and ATX here, so make sure that you screw in the ones you need. Screwing in one of the wrong mounts has the potential to cause a short.

4: Install the Switches

Now these were a real pain. Here I knocked them in using the hammer and drift because the holes were made ever so slightly smaller by the powder coating. Installing them by hand is probably possible, but one good thwack with a hammer and they were in. It's important to use the drift as it will prevent damage to the button. Once they're in, press on the locking washer and do up the nut by hand. This can be very fiddly due to the very thin nut. If you're having too much trouble tightening them up, you should be able to forfeit the locking washer.

5: Install the PCI bracket

Once again using the longer of the screws, install the PCI bracket. I'd recommend not to do it up fully at this stage, as you might need to adjust it when installing the expansion cards.

5: Install the base into the outer shell.

I would strongly advise you to Install the PSU, drives and any other components needed on the lower level before installing it as this will save a fair amount of hassle later.

Slide in the base but be sure to avoid the screw thread that is protruding out from the case feet by simply lifting the tray 1/2" every time. Watch out for the screws holding in the hardware mounts as well. Once the tray is in place, line up the holes in the base with the mounting holes on the outer shell and then bolt them together.

Now the DimasTech Bench Table is finished and ready for torturing some poor, unsuspecting hardware!

DimasTech Bench Table Page: 3

Appearance

With the case assembled it was time to stand back and take a good look at it. The black and blue theme is quite pleasing, but the DimasTech Bench Table comes in a variety of colours to suit different tastes. I'll probably cop some abuse for saying this but I've never been a massive fan of powder coating, however, the finish surpassed my expectations and was quite impressive.

Unfortunately with the silky gloss black finish showed up dust like a blood stain in a snow field. But If your looking for a case like this then chances are it'll be in use so often that dust wont be given a chance to gather.

The curvy design of the DimasTech Bench Table gives it an overall classy, polished look. And while a few imperfections were present you wouldn't notice them without close inspection. While good looks are not normally a necessity for a bench table, this one has proved that the two can go hand-in-hand.

Features

Along with the appearance, the features will be another short section when compared to a lot of cases today. When it comes down to it, the Bench Table is pretty basic - omprising of nothing more than mounts for the hardware.

As you saw earlier the case comes with a decent selection of fan mounts. This version is designed to accommodate a Thermochill radiator, and subsequently, most of the brackets supplied were 90° ones. This allows the user to mount fans to blow over the RAM slots, PWM''s and other areas of a motherboard that could suffer from a lack of airflow when watercooling is installed. There is an upright bracket supplied that caters for blowing air through vertical heatsinks or into GPU coolers, and with different versions of the Bench Table you get a few more vertical mounts.

Down one side of the case you can see the mounting specially cut for Thermochill Radiators. The DimasTech Bench Table is also able to accommodate Black Ice and Swiftech radiators for those with different components. I would have liked to see some sort on universal fitting that could have accommodated both sizes of radiator (120.3 and 120.2) but perhaps that's asking a bit much.

Next up we have the pump/reservoir mount and It is designed to accommodate nearly anything you want by simply bolting it on. The pump/reservoir mount attaches onto the base and bridges the upper and lower levels of the Bench Table.

Finally, a little mention goes to the decent length motherboard standoffs. This will probably raise an eyebrow or two for the more casual and tower case oriented amongst us, so I'll quickly explain. The backplates on sub-zero solutions are often quite thick in order to accommodate a thin layer of insulation. Normal stand-off's are often not tall enough to accommodate this, but thankfully the ones here allow you use thicker insulation as you see fit.

Moving on we put the case through its paces...

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Installation and Testing

Once again the usual testing procedure used for cases here at OC3D has been foiled by the DimasTech Bench Table. The whole point of the Bench Table is to to allow you to swap out components fairly easily. As there aren't any walls on or around the components to impede airflow, the temperatures of the parts used will be unaffected by the case.

So to keep with the product's intended use I will be testing it by installing two setups, each with different cooling solutions to ensure that the case's ease of use is up to the level that a case of this nature should reach.

Setup 1: Air Cooling - OCZ Vendetta II

Relying on the air around it to dissipate the heat, air cooling should do well with the DimasTech Bench Table as there is nothing to impede the flow or trap hot air around the components.

Installing the first set of test components including the Vendetta II was nothing short of a doddle. Mounting the motherboard on the outside of the case, and placing the components as you would on the tray of any regular case, everything is securely held in place with thumb screws. The cables weaved their way up through the purpose cut holes and plugged in, which keeps the setup looking neat and tidy.

Installing water-cooling into the DimasTech Bench Table proved considerably more challenging than air cooling - requiring a little thought and planning to ensure everything fit. Mounting the radiator into the lower section was the easiest part of the job, followed by fitting the pump into the provided mount sticking out of the side of the case. Unfortunately, I couldn't get my Laing DDC pump to fit onto the bracket regardless of what position I tried to mount it. This doesn't mean that it doesn't fit however, just the lack of instructions have crippled what should have been an easy installation. In the end I used just a single bolt to just keep the pump and reservoir in place.

Once the components were mounted it was time to add the tubing. Routing the XSPC 1/2" Tubing through the case's interior wasn't really possible simply due to it being too thick to fit though the cable holes, but for this simple loop there was no real issue by routing it around the outside of the case.

Thoughts

After spending a good few hours swapping parts in and out, it was clear that the DimasTech Bench Table had the majority of its objectives ticked. Changing out the major components in a system was easy as pie. Graphics cards, Ram and CPUs could be switched in a matter of minutes, with motherboard removal being only a little bit more effort. Keeping the less frequently change components on the bottom half means that the whole table is very practical. It also aids in keeping the working area clear of cables that would otherwise have strewn themselves all over the place.

Once the water-cooling parts were in place it would be the same scenario as with the PSU and drive bays. The block would be simply removed from the components on the upper level while they were being swapped out. After the initial installation, everything would be trouble free.

Finally, I should mention that this bench table would be ideal for either dry ice or liquid nitrogen benchmarking - as it provides a solid platform on which to mount everything. A Single stage or Cascade phase change cooling setup could also sit at home on the DimasTech Bench Table, although accommodating the two could take up rather a lot of space.

Let's head over the page to see how the DimasTech Bench Table scored....

DimasTech Bench Table Page: 5

Conclusion

At the start of this review I stated that this case is attempting to occupy a niche gap in the market, and form what I've seen over my time with it I can safely say that the DimasTech Bench table fills it nicely. Any enthusiast that swaps out parts on a regular basis, whether it be for benchmarking, reviewing or just people who love new hardware. I'm sure that many would agree that the standard tower case is not the most ideal of designs to cater for their needs - and that's where this case excels.

Able to accommodate nearly any kind of cooling solution and hardware combination there are very few things to pick with the DimasTech Bench Table. The largest flaw was the lack of a concise instruction manual, which after a little time with the case isn't a major issue and hopefully the guide on page two of this review should help anyone trying to assemble their set up.

The case can be obtained directly from DimasTech's site, although it would be far easier for us in the UK to head over to Chilled PC and order one form there. They come in at a very reasonable GBP129.99. While it is a fair whack of cash for what is essentially a basic case, but the way the bench table is designed,and the overall quality of it makes it a worthwhile investment to anyone who regularly swaps out hardware. The only real competition for this case is the Antec Skeleton witch weighs in at roughly the same price and, in this reviewers opinion, doesn't look half as nice.